Can They Eat Too Much or Too Little?
Children can absolutely eat too much or too little food. If children are not guided well, or they are guided inappropriately by parents who have their own food issues or are uneducated, this could make for serious problems. Of course, not teaching kids to recognize when they are full or satiated can certainly set them up for eating too much—increasing their risk for overweight and obesity.
Parents need to learn what a child’s portion size is—kids are not mini-adults, and should not be served that way. Overeating, or super-sizing in a fast food restaurant, for instance, is undeniably the fastest way to a weight problem. Limits must be set in terms of how much children eat, how much snacking they partake in, and what favorites might be brought into the house that might promote overeating.
Eating too little, at the other end of the spectrum, is a very serious issue, with potentially severe consequences. Generally, young children are just not “good eaters.” They are picky, or they are playing a game of control with their parents and end up malnourished.
Your pediatrician can recognize this immediately, as they plot your child on the CDC’s Growth Chart during a checkup, and see that your child is failing to grow or “failing to thrive” as it is called in the medical industry.
“Catching up” is critical—you never want to stunt a child’s growth, for any reason. A registered dietitian is well equipped to put the child back on track to being a healthful eater, making a nutrition plan with the goal of taking in adequate calories and nutrients.
Fact
At least 10 percent of females in the United States suffer from an eating disorder. Eating disorder victims can range from as young as five- to eight-year-olds, to women in their fifties and sixties. Generally, there are two “types” of eating disorder patients: those who are in a very difficult phase of life, and with effective therapies can overcome the eating disorder and lead a normal life, and those who live forever with symptoms of their food issues, never living a normal life, some even succumbing to death.
The eating disorders anorexia nervosa and bulimia are mechanisms teens (and lately preteens) will use to maintain thinness. This is a serious psychological issue, with food being the symptom of a much larger problem.
It is vital for you to get professional help for your children if you see “strange” eating habits, such as: pushing food around on their plate, skipping meals, eliminating “fats” or “carbs” completely from their diets, throwing up after a meal, or just eating very little.
Do not pass this off as a stage or a “phase of life” — do seek psychological help from a therapist with eating disorder experience.
